to the victor, the spoils
by howlingmoonrise
Summary: AU. The events that lead Mulan to take her father's place went differently, leaving her to stay behind in the farm while Fa Zhu departs for war. Shan Yu's forces are not so easily predicted, however, and when their presence threatens the remaining members of the Fa family, one act of bravery is all it takes for Mulan to be taken along and become a warrior on her own right.
1. One

**A/N:** **so my other shan yu/mulan story was surprisingly well-received? at the time i had started writing this longfic for those two as well, based on my sudden revelation back then that shan yu was the only character in the movie to not have looked down on mulan in any way... but then i ended up forgetting about it in my wips folder. oops.**

 **hope you guys like this one as well, though! reviews are always welcome ;)**

* * *

There is a woman.

Shan Yu has never put much stock in Han women - cowering things, all the rage and passion and other things that made one _alive_ beaten out of them, suppressed until they cannot even speak unless someone else prompts them to. He would like to say he despises them, just as he despises the ones that have made them so, but this is the truth: in his eyes, they do not exist.

Invisible things, worthless things, as good as flowers and vases and paintings. This empire has bred them to have very little purpose beyond childbearing and decoration. They do not exist. _They do not exist_.

But, there is a _woman_.

She stands defiant, teeth bared in a snarl as she stands between one of his men and a child too young for war. "You won't take her," she defies, and does not yield when his man laughs.

He cannot help but watch.

"Who's going to stop me, little lady?" The soldier licks at his teeth, leering. "You?"

" _Mulan_ ," another woman whispers, clearly terrified. She tugs at the _woman_ , at the silks adorning her, trying to pull her back without calling too much attention to herself. " _Don't._ "

The _woman_ frees herself from the other's grasp, never looking away. "If you're coward enough to try."

But she's now aware of her position, awoken from her bravery by the desperation in the other's voice. Aware of how his soldiers are staring, aware of the tears struggling not to spill on the face of the other woman - perhaps her mother? - aware of how she's a tiny slip of a girl, untrained for nothing beyond pouring tea and painting her face to please their men, aware of the danger she's putting all of them in. Her eyes flicker.

She hesitates.

His man does not.

He slaps her away with the back of his hand, sending her flying against a table with wares to sell. There's hairpins and colourful sashes of fabric and all kinds of other pretty, useless things that the Han people seem to enjoy so much they'd let their guard down for the opportunity to buy; his troops had planned the attack for this occasion exactly. There are no longer any men in this village, all taken for combat near the borders, near that disgraceful wall their cowardly emperor had built in his fear.

They had not imagined his forces had reached this far, and it is just as Shan Yu had predicted. How very shameful of them.

" _Mulan!_ " the woman shouts, but she, too, is cowardly - she does not dare approach.

The Han people are all cowards, and the wide circle that opens when his man reaches to grab the girl by the hair is all the proof he needs. Shan Yu has seen all he needs to see, snarling as he gathers his personal guard to move on from this ridiculous place.

A howl of agony comes from behind him.

It is not from the girl.

Blood on the ground, blood on delicate hands with orchid-soft fingers, splattering ruby-red droplets everywhere like jewels from the emperor's treasure, and all he hears is this: _warrior, warrior, warrior_. She is a mighty thing, a wildcat cub struggling to stand up on weak legs, letting blood dribble from her split lip in a way that coats her teeth in red. The blood on the ground, however, isn't hers. His soldier is screaming, holding onto his face and batting wildly at anyone foolish enough to come close; the rest of the villagers are pale and terrified, even more so than before.

"Enough." One word. The chaos stops.

The _woman_ spits her bloody saliva on the ground, viscous and pink against the dirt, and for once Shan Yu is hiding his pleasure rather than the opposite.

His dismount from his horse is slow, enough to buy him a few more moments of thoughtfulness; his personal guard knows not to interfere when it is so. But the other man is not one of his elite warriors - he is foolish, whimpering when told to be quiet, and Shan Yu can do nothing but raise an eyebrow at the meticulously crafted hair pin stuck into his eyeball when his hand moves enough to grant a glimpse at it.

The _woman_ sways. Mulan, he thinks they had called her, and it is not a Hun name but it is much like her - strong, but not unyielding, soft enough to be deceitful. He takes three measured steps in her direction: one, and the villagers flinch back; two, and the child she had protected runs off; three, and there is no one there to hold her steady when she stumbles.

His hands are rough, but he does not let her fall. She is fearful, just like the others, and weak, and soft - there is no muscle tested underneath his hands, no hardness of steel beneath the fabric, no practised courage of a soldier in the way she stands - but there is _something_ there. He can see it. From his shoulder, Hayabusa screeches her loud agreement, making the girl flick her eyes warily towards the falcon before she turns them back wide to meet his.

"You will tell me your name," he drawls, a pleasant smirk in place. "Or I shall only call you 'little Han woman' for as long as you shall live."

Her eyes are metal-cold, metal-harsh, metal-unforgiving. "I am Fa Mulan."

He laughs.

It is not a cheerful sound, and it has been crafted not to be. It's a laugh honed through years of battles and plans, of blood on his sword and of sweat on his horse's back; it is meant to frighten. There is no sound on this village beyond the whimpering of his wounded soldier, and his laughter.

His soldiers know to fear what comes next.

"Fa Mulan," he sneers. There is no forgiveness in his voice. "You have defied my men, and as such you have defied me."

There is a struggle in her gaze, one he has seen too many times in soldiers with far less courage than her. To drop her eyes and plead for mercy, to beg for her family to be spared, or to die with the kind of honor usually reserved only to men?

"Please." Another woman steps forward, silver-haired and hobbling on knobby limbs. "She forgets herself. Please, spare her."

"Are you volunteering in her place, then?" He does not bother to hide his cruel smirk. "She does not seem to be the only one to forget herself."

The old woman hesitates. "If it will spare her-"

"Grandmother, _no!_ " Fa Mulan tries to jerk herself out of his grasp, to throw herself once more in the path of someone's sword. She then turns seething eyes upon him when he holds her in place instead of letting go, hands tight enough to bruise when she struggles. "Do you kill all innocents this easily? Is your honor threatened by so little?"

"Do tell me, Fa Mulan." He leans in close, bending down so there is no escaping his gaze. Her breath comes fast, in short, scared little gasps that have him wondering at how someone can be so brave and so terrified all at once. "Will you hide your eyes when I kill your family for your crimes? Will you bend to your knees and beg for them, knowing I am not a merciful man?"

Her upper lip curls, showing teeth stained with pink. "There is no point to begging if you will kill us anyway."

For a moment, there is nothing but the scent of her blood. His smirk widens, shifting into a fully animalistic grin. Lesser men have cowered.

 _She_ does not.

"I can be merciful, Fa Mulan." Her nostrils flare at his words. Afraid, so afraid of him like all wise men, but she does not look away. What a brave little Han, what a jewel he's found in this ridiculous excuse for a village. "So tell me: what are you willing to do to save your family?"

"If you give me your word?" Fa Mulan raises her head, meeting his gaze. "Whatever I must."

He hums in ponderation, studying her features - as if he had not decided this, as if he had not planned for this since the moment he saw her with defiance in her eyes and blood on her hands when no one else would step forth and help.

Shan Yu is extremely satisfied. "Very well. Prepare your things; we'll be leaving soon."

He drops her, letting gravity and the weakness of her limbs do the job of putting her on the ground. She splutters, coughing as the air is forced from her lungs by the impact.

" _We?_ " she asks, disbelieving.

Shan Yu smiles.

It is not nice. Like his laugh, it's not meant to be.

Hayabusa takes flight when he raises his hand, signalling to his troops that this decision is final. "Patch up my soldier before you say your goodbyes, Fa Mulan. You will be coming with us."

He does not bother to look back.


	2. Two

**A/N: thank you so much for all the lovely reviews! i've actually had this chapter written since before i started posting the story, but i'm not used to multichapter fics these days so i kept forgetting to upload it OTL**

 **i hope you guys enjoy this one as well! feedback is always welcome~**

* * *

He is a Hun.

Fa Mulan grits her teeth, tasting blood as she watches their leader walk away from her, giving the order lightly, fleetingly, as if he's not uprooting her full life and bringing her into a new one filled with horrors she cannot even begin to imagine. _Shan Yu_ \- that is his name, at least from what she has heard from the terrified whispers all around her - has brought terror to the Empire. He has slain countless villages, taking victims in numbers far beyond the amount of moments she has lived through; he has defeated entire armies on his own.

She cannot help but fear that amongst such armies had been her father.

He had left before she could do anything about it, urged on to take his horse and sword and armour and trade them for their tears and sorrows in their place. _Fa Zhou_ , the great soldier, the war hero, respected by all for his military prowess but not for his worth as a father. Fa Mulan has wept bitterly over his absence.

Fa Mulan has very little to lose, now.

She cannot bring herself to meet the eyes of her mother, or her grandmother, or of any of the villagers, knowing what they are seeing: someone without honor. Someone who spoke out of place, who might have brought death upon them all if things had gone differently, someone who has blood covering her hands and teeth and the front of her _hanfu_ like a child who has spilt their soup.

 _Dishonored_ , they will call her, but her bitterness is too deep to listen.

"Mulan."

Grandmother reaches for her. Her hands move to grasp for Mulan's bloody ones, uncaring of the mess, and Mulan decides that she will not stain her family any further.

"No," she says, and pulls her own hands away; she refuses to meet her gaze. Fa Li does not attempt to gaze at her, eyes staring to the ground and to the left, though her expression is worried. Mulan feels her throat dry. "This is my burden to bear. I made that choice."

"You made no choice to go, child," Fa Li says softly. "We can hide you, say you slipped away."

But she cannot; all three of them know this. Mulan has grown up with tales of her father and war, of spoils and sword and slaughter when no one thought she was listening, and she knows that leaving will sign a death sentence for her family, and the rest of the village after them. The Empire might forgive them if she was disinherited, erased from her family's line and memory.

The Huns will not.

She closes her eyes, sways on the spot. Her voice is not as strong as she'd like it to be. "It's best if you forget me."

"You are the daughter of your father, Mulan." Fa Li reaches forward, meeting her gaze one last time. "We cannot forget you."

There are no tears. Not with the soldiers still around.

No tears. No weakness. No pain.

"We will get your things," Fa Li promises. "Do as they bid and patch up the Hun, before they punish you further. And be careful, child."

Her chin drops in a pretense of a nod.

Mulan cannot avoid Grandmother's hands, this time. She presses something living to them, something that twitches in her hand, and something else that is hard yet delicate. The cricket. The haircomb. Reminders of that day that seems like a dream, now, at the matchmaker's, when Mulan had thought it had been the worst thing that could happen in her whole life. When her father had left for war - and today, when _she'll_ be forced to go, too - shame had covered such a stupid thought.

But there is something about Grandmother Fa's countenance that makes Mulan lean forward before she can think about it, and Grandmother brings her mouth close to her ear in return: a secret.

"I will pray to the ancestors for you," she whispers. "For the fiercest and mightiest guardian. I have faith in you, Mulan. You will live through this, and find your way to happiness."

Mulan bows her head, letting her hair hide the tears that threaten to fall.

 _No tears where they can see_ , she promises herself. _No tears._

* * *

It is gruesome.

She had done it herself, with her bloody hands and her bloody face, under the orders of some instinct she does not want to understand. Fa Mulan is not a soldier, or a warrior, or the kind of person that can stab into someone's eyeball with a hairpin without regret. Fa Mulan is a graceful, delicate, dutiful daughter who strives only to bring honor to her family.

 _Maybe if I repeat it enough times, it'll become true._ She has the hysterical urge to laugh.

There is no saving the eye, and she has to run for the edge of the house and vomit hot, acidic bile at the suctioning sound the hairpin makes when they slide it off. _I'm sorry_ , she wants to beg, to cry. _I did not mean it. I did not want it_. But that, too, is a lie.

Mulan does not know what that makes of her.

She bandages the Hun soldier - blissfully unconscious, blissfully unaware that it is her tending to his wounds with badly-washed hands and eyes struggling to contain useless tears - as best as she can under the doctor's instructions. Neither of them will risk Shan Yu knowing it wasn't her doing it as he ordered, but she doesn't know how to do it on her own and the doctor will not let the village suffer for her incompetence, no matter how much he might dislike her. The pin is placed on the table, deceitfully innocent after being removed and cleaned. She does not know why they bother.

It would have been a lovely thing. Father might have bought it for her or for Mother if he had seen it, with its delicate colours and the plum blossom beads shining in the light; perhaps to wear for a wedding. Perhaps for _her_ wedding.

That, too, will never happen now.

Mulan tells herself that it is not something to be thankful for.

Grandmother comes to fetch her when she's done, ignoring the jeers from the other Hun soldiers watching. "A bath," she says, and her voice has regained some strength. "And then we'll eat. You need to gather your strength, dear one."

She lets Grandmother guide her, feeling her heart set to cold stone. She will bathe. She will feed. She will pray to the ancestors, and to all those that might be listening, all those that would offer her aid. Her reflection does not show her true self, nor the hopeful bride, nor the dutiful daughter - none of the things she ever begged it to show - but within its gaze she finds her answer.

Fa Mulan lights a stick of incense, and prays not for herself, but for her family. _Protection. Honor. Courage. Comfort._ All the things she could never give them, and that she sorely wishes she could. Mulan trades her silks for riding clothes, the offering of an apple for determination, and her jade beads for a knife. The great stone dragon in their yard watches and judges as she makes her way past it, and she cannot tell what it decides. But she knows _her_ decision.

 _No more tears._

Fa Mulan is the last of her line. There is no place for tears in her eyes.


	3. Three

**A/N: *arrives several months late with starbucks* in my defense, between my slow writing, classes, and an internetless summer, i kinda. um. forgot? i had this waiting? oops?**

 **thank you so much for everyone who took the time to review! i hope you continue enjoying this fic, and no, it's not abandoned :'D**

 **feedback makes my day~ TuT**

* * *

 _No more tears_ , Fa Mulan had promised herself, and it only takes half a day until she's wavering on that promise.

Fa Zhou had taken the family's horse with him, though it had been more Mulan's than his. She's glad for it, happy that Khan can carry him when his family and his crippled leg and his pride cannot, and all the happier when the Huns cannot add another horse to their army. But her feet are blistering in her riding shoes when she's forced to keep pace beside hardened warriors for so long, made raw with effort and road grit: each of their steps are two of hers. It's made all the worse by the blindfold set over her eyes, darkening her vision enough that she must go by the rhythm and sounds of the march, or risk walking into any of the soldiers all around her. She struggles to gasp in large gulps of air, lungs burning, but the Hun troops are relentless in her pace. Mulan finds herself stumbling into the men more than once before being forcefully shoved back in place.

She wishes for Khan, if only for the comfort his presence would bring. She wishes for Father, and Mother, and Grandma Fa, for their country home with the clucking chickens and the clever Little Brother, and even for the matchmaker and the choking hold of the cloying oils and winding silks of a bride-to-be. Better the silks than the army's march; better the derisive stares from her peers than the puzzled ones from those that would rather see her dead. She does not understand why Shan Yu has picked her or for what purpose, but it cannot be a reward.

This is punishment.

At last - _at last!_ \- there is an order from the front to stop for rations and to water the horses, and the army slows to a sudden, jerky stop that has her hands and knees meeting the ground before she's able to catch on. There are laughs, and jeers, and Mulan both loathes and appreciates her blind: at least with it on the humiliated redness of her cheeks won't be as evident.

"Take that off her," someone orders, and she's hauled to her feet before she can do it herself. "Doubt she can find her way back anymore, at this point."

 _So that was the point of it_ , Mulan thinks, and then curses herself for not keeping better track of the way, useless as it might have been. The blind is jerked from her head, roughly yanking several strands of her hair with it; she winces at the new light. The sun is not kind to her eyes, which have grown used to the darkness of the blind while they've been walking; she has to blink fast to regain any resemblance of sight.

Before her is one of Shan Yu's elite, as wide as a bear, and he does not seem amused.

"Drink," he says, roughly pushing an open waterskin into her bound hands. It sloshes part of its contents on her palms, leaving them muddy and slippery, and she scrambles to right it before the whole thing ends up on the ground.

"Thank you," she mutters before she can forget to, already drinking the water in large, greedy gulps. A moment later, she thinks _I should not have thanked him_ , because she owes them nothing, and she tempers her sudden rage by drinking slower, tasting the water. Nothing else in it that she can tell, poison or otherwise: it's the best water she's ever tasted, if only because she has never felt a thirst so great.

All the same, she knows better than to drink the whole thing, knows better than to drink too much on an empty stomach, knows better than to push her captor's temper. Soon - regretfully soon - she hands it back.

The man watches her with crossed arms, unamused. "Keep it," he says. "You can fill it in the river, before we go."

The _don't think you can slip away, when you do_ goes unspoken. Mulan shrinks her arms back to herself, cradling the waterskin to her chest. "Why?"

He furrows his brow, the confusion strangely at odds with the stone-set lines of his face. "Why refill the water?"

"I know that much!" she snaps back, regretting her own impulsiveness right after. It was the very thing that got her into this trouble, in the first place. She turns her face to the side so she does not have to meet the warrior's gaze, fearful of what she might find there, and then, more softly, "Why did you bring me along?"

The large warrior studies her face, but he does not answer.

* * *

They keep going.

It's a punishing pace, meant for trained soldiers, she knows, she _knows_ , but though Mulan had been the most active girl in the village by far, she is tired down to her bones. It's demeaning. It's tiring. She never wanted so much to throw herself to the dusty ground, Hun warriors surrounding her or not, so long as she would not have to get up again.

When they make camp she's too tired to feel hungry, though their last stop was hours ago. They still give her a portion of the ration, even if their shifting eyes make it clear that they don't particularly _want_ to, nor do they understand why she's in their midst: the common soldiers are not privy to their leader's thoughts.

She's almost too tired to feel afraid.

They have not touched her, yet. Not beyond rough hands leading her this way and that way, making sure her hands are still bound and that she does not stumble over their feet after stumbling on _hers_ , but she has grown with war stories, with old soldiers drunk and talking when they think she's not listening. And she has never been a perfect daughter, lovely as a blossoming flower, graceful as a river, but a woman is a woman and now that they have settled for the night, she does not think the Huns will be kind.

So she draws back, huddled tight. Her hands measure the sharp hairpin she has tucked away in the folds of her riding clothes, loose enough that they might forget that she is indeed a woman, loose enough to hide the knife at her waist, the one that she will not risk showing until things get really dire. Some of these men might remember the one she'd blinded, lost to adrenaline and impulse, and be wary of her enough that they will not dare try anything right away, but in truth Fa Mulan is not sure if she could do it again.

Her hands tighten around the pin, its delicate beads crackling and threatening to break.

If it comes down to it, she must.

* * *

It does not come down to it.

Fa Mulan hides in the shadows of the camp, where she will be less noticed, but it's a useless game to play in a place where the winners have already been decided. And it's a strange thing - they watch her, but not as the men in the village do. Cautious, when she is nothing to their size; watchful, when there is nothing she can do. Her mind whirs, wondering if she could get away with throwing the hot charcoals of the campfire to their eyes if they let her near it, wondering if she could untie one of the horses and mount it before they notice she is gone. Likely not, she thinks.

For all that the Emperor's soldiers paint the Huns as a beastly force, devoid of thought and grace, that sort of men would have never gotten past the Wall.

They give her a blanket. Arrange for a minimal sort of privacy, when she must relieve herself, and she's not sure whether she'd prefer her long _hanfu_ or her riding clothes for such a task, when half of it is spent checking for watchers and nearly unbalancing herself over the soiled ground as a consequence of it. No bath: even if they had offered, she would not have taken it. She bites back a _thank you_ more than once, cut in half: they do not owe her these mercies, but neither does she.

Even now, when it's clear they won't turn to her for entertainment, she cannot help but feel too vulnerable, too exposed. Not knowing her purpose here does not help; Shan Yu is too far from this circle of escorts for her to try and overhear anything useful, and if the first elite had been any indication, none of the others will tell.

So Mulan watches, wary and worn. Watches as their great forms hunker down around the fire, sharing a meal in a charged sort of silence, as if they are too aware of her own small curled form to be truly comfortable. Watches as a faint music comes from another campfire in the distance; watches as boredom eventually makes itself known and the men bring out dice and game pieces to play on boards drawn on dirt. Watches as they watch her back, measuring shifts as one man is traded for another, as one of the elite leaves to meet with those of the next group over and comes back with his expression blank.

She wants to ask. She wants to know. But she's only Fa Mulan, who got herself into this by being reckless when she should not be, and she cannot bring herself to draw their attention. So she can only study them, until her lids are too heavy and swollen and bone-dry for her to hold open, and then hides her face in the blanket that smells too much like horse and too little like home.

If it grows damp with her tears, none but her will ever know.

Fa Mulan dreams of home.


End file.
